What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[Teraq]

The Final Fantasy XIV fanbase and gatekeeping depression while using it as a headcanon excuse for their poor persecuted sadboi and calling you ableist if you call it out, name a more iconic duo!

… okay, so we have the FFXIV fanbase and crying about Sundered genocide while excusing Ancient genocide …
… the FFXIV fanbase and being literally unable to comprehend why people love the shameless villains without an excuse …
… the FFXIV fanbase and unironically treating Hermes like he Lived In A Society, Bottom Text, and was the first step for Gotham City …
… the FFXIV fanbase and saying you didn't watch the cutscenes or read the dialogue …
… the FFXIV fanbase and saying you watched the cutscenes and read the dialogue too seriously and are nitpicking …
… the FFXIV fanbase and saying That Would Have Been Predictable, Thank God You Aren't The Writer …
… the FFXIV fanbase and saying you need to have a very high IQ and read Nietzsche / Utopia / have depression / a deep understanding of buddhism / have been a frontline first responder during the worst of the covid pandemic to have a chance at enjoying the deep themes of FINAL FANTASY FOURTEEN ONLINE: ENDWALKER: SIX POINT OH …

All right, so maybe it's becoming a bit of a crowded competition.

At first, I thought the short story was mid tbf, much less eye-roll-inducing than I was expecting Re: Hermes being THE ONLY ANCIENT WHO FEELS AND IS RELATABLE AND HUMAN!!!!!! But wow, do Twitter and Reddit ever have a way of ruining things for everyone with a satisfyingly crenelated diencephalon.

Of course, I should add the disclaimer that I read this story in French. As Lauront said, comparing the two, it is rather obvious a lot of the words used and the way sentences come across result in an overall less hostile/antagonistic towards his society Hermes. Like, his little "Tell yourself what you need to believe"? It isn't there at all. He blames himself for "asking himself so many absurd questions". No accusation of "utilitarian logic", simply that the argument that she could be recreated was hard to refute. No "he internalized the lie", merely "He resigned himself to his fate: accepting his peers' forgiveness" (oh no how terrible lmao). Honestly? I would say localisation is being really biased here – whichever of the two deviates most from the original Japanese author's intent, I cannot say, but I will merely say the past occurrences haven't been in EN's favor when it comes to sticking to JP.
(btw, SEAL CLAP @ the EN slipping in yet another reference to Answers in the last line lmao.)

And so this will go down as yet another instance of the Ancient society being so mean and conformist and callous towards any life that wasn't theirs, while Hermes was a hero for daring to think different and selectively mourning the murderwolves without paying attention to the okyupetes they slain being the only one who cared. He's so tortured. Nobody understands him! They all offer him PLATITUDES! He's the nail that sticks out until they hammer him to become another brick in the wall!(*) He OBVIOUSLY had DEPRESSION and this was a completely foreign concept to Ancients who, as can be seen right here, NEVER tried to offer any help, and also they definitely didn't have sort of therapy or mental healthcare because idk that's just the vibes I get!!! Only my WoL understands him…

Never mind that all of this is his own point of view. Honestly this was the thing I was most afraid of when it came to the inevitable Hermes short story we would get. I wish this had been like the Watcher's short story at least: about Venat, but pointedly not from her own PoV – though from the PoV of someone who agreed with her, at least it was a third party… somewhat. But ultimately, just like I could dismiss the first story's embarrassing gushing over Venat as it being from the Watcher's PoV and thus perfectly in-character for GigaSimpeus of Anamnesis Anyder, I am going to dismiss this one as being from the PoV of the Ancient world's most conceited edgelord who, as we know from the MSQ, never actually talked much to any human being around him outside of a professional context. All I see in this story is a man who thinks himself superior to his SHEEPLE peers and rebukes any and all attempt to be nice to him and help him – because he doesn't want help. He's a man on a mission, and that mission is showing them all. Also appreciate that it acknowledges his hypocrisy in siccing his precious animals on the party.

If I were to criticise the structure of the short story itself, though, it's that it's a little all over the place. First Ktisis, then Meteion's conception, then the death of one of her sisters (nice confirmation of Ancients being able to feel intense emotions btw, FR), then a fast-forward through his life after Ktisis. It feels more like a summary of his character – from his PoV – than an actual short story. I would have rather liked a vignette of one or two better-defined moments of his life. Particularly, I wanted to know more about his actual tenure as Fandaniel, preferably from the PoV of a fellow Convocation member who knew him from his time as Elpis director, like Loghrif, Mitron, Halmarut or Lahabrea.

Also I want to address the counter-argument of "SEE? HE ACTUALLY PEER-REVIEWED METEION, YOU (WRONG) ANCIENT LOVING MEANIES!". The text only ever mentions his colleagues helping him with conceiving Meteion's appearance. There is no evidence here any of them knew of Meteion's inner workings. In fact, the sole evidence comes from the MSQ, and it points to the contrary: Timaeus, a fellow ornithologist who talks way too much, has no idea how Meteion was made, and is surprised when we tell him about Dynamis, which he hasn't heard of "for centuries". Then, of course, Hythlodaeus makes it clear the concept was never submitted to the Bureau, which, if anything, would be their equivalent of peer reviewing – and he would have rejected it (though he's saying this in a context that is rather incriminating in the first place, which most likely biases him).
Honestly I question if the people who think what we see in this story is "peer review" have ever worked in a clinical research department. This isn't peer review, this is chatting with the data manager during lunch break.

Oh, and depression. Again, I will remind everyone that Ishikawa has never come out and said she intended him to have clinical depression. She doesn't have to, no, but given how controversial the character is (and she knew he would be), I am going to take her silence on the issue as her intending us to take Hermes at face value: an emotional man, yes, but one with no low self-esteem, negative cognitive bias, lack of energy to get out of bed or delusions of inadequacy or guilt. It doesn't look to me like we are meant to assume he is anything but rational, if impulsive (classic Leo!). I would even say that the insistence on his character suffering from clinical depression seems like an attempt to excuse him and make him more sympathetic than he actually is.
I'll be frank, this depression discourse around Hermes and the way his fanpersons dismiss criticism by gatekeeping a rather common mental illness with very varied clinical manifestations is what drove me off Ascian/Ancient Twitter for good immediately after Endwalker released. The insufferable self-righteousness of these people taking their headcanon of Hermes for granted and thinking their own diagnosed illness makes them the authority on how bad a person you must be for disliking his character and the way he was written into the story instantly alienated me from a crowd I used to enjoy sharing a fandom with.
The funny thing is, I've been diagnosed with clinical depression and treated for it (in fact, it was related to how unfit my too-empathetic self was for the job I was doing. Amusing, isn't it?). So have a fair number of people I know with a significant dislike of Hermes (and Endwalker as a whole). And while I personally do not feel too strongly about Hermes himself, mostly about how his character is used to obviously demean Ancients, some of these people are outright offended by the presumed portrayal of a mentally ill man as unstable, abusive and violent, before graduating to omnicidal out of sheer spite.
So please. Enough about ascertaining Hermes suffers from depression. Not only is it only an interpretation of the character – one that is valid IMO, but that is unfortunately too often conveniently used to cast him in a sympathetic light and throw an entire people under the bus – but your personal experience of depression is not everyone's, and you are acting as callously towards other patients as you claim detractors do. This inane discourse makes me feel like I need to take a shower… and my Effexor.




(*) I am incredibly sorry for making you picture Hermes simps nodding at this while pretentiously listening to Pink Floyd and going SO TRUE BESTIE he's just like me fr fr